Options

A person needs to know they have options. Whether it be schooling, career, or health....options give us hope.

So, I visited my oncologist last week to discuss my options. First of all, I needed to be clear about where the cancer had exactly recurred.

Dr. C described the area of all the tumor growth as the subcutaneous tissue outside my abdomen. "You mean I have cancer of my fat??", I asked. She replied flaty, "No, you have ovarian cancer. "It just happens to have recurred (as you so eloquently put it).. in the fat." "Can I have liposuction?", I asked. "No, Ramona......liposuction is not considered a cancer treatment." I was a bit deflated. I thought I was onto something there for a minute.

She pulled out a list of treatments and from the top, she read the list of possibilities I could try for my new chemotherapy, As she went down the list, it seemed as though I could have very easily just been ordering a meal from a menu.....I surveyed the information, and finally decided on Carboplatin with a side of Doxil...... "Are you sure you wouldn't like to try the Taxol?" she asked. "No thanks. I'm keeping the hair this time around."

So, in a couple of weeks, we will begin...again.

When I returned from the doctor's office, my family opened a bottle of champagne....to celebrate the fact that I still have options.....and with options, I have hope.

One More Dance

Just let me dance one more dance.

I promise I won't stay too long.

The night's slowly fading, the day is awaking and

I've been waiting so very long.

Love ones around me, dancing beside me, never wanting me to fall.

Just let me dance one more dance

Besides...they are finally playing my song.

Just Be Okay

I have a very favorite television show that I watch. It is called The Big C. It chronicles the life of a terminally ill woman with cancer. Doesn't sound like a barrel of laughs? It is....and so much more.

Laura Linney plays the protagonist who is diagnosed with terminal cancer and through the various plot lines, she tries to come to terms with her illness and her limited time. I'm glued. I get it. I wonder how the writers of the show knew that those exact things were going on at the same time in my own life?

I've learned so much about myself through watching this series, especially in perspective to how she worries about her son's life after her death. When she recieves her diagnosis, all rationality goes out the window. She is on a short time line. Everything is urgent. Although he is just a teenerager going through the usual teenager growing pains, there is no time for that. She must fix him. He must mature, be happy, be productive and completely have life figured out before she is comfortable dying. And.......it does'nt happen. And it won't happen.

Sometimes we have to accept that life does not happen according to our own agenda or timeline. We can't speed up the process of life and maturity, no matter how much it may mean to us. We just have to understand that each person grows in their own time frame and according to their own plans. Cancer can make a person selfish. I've accepted alot lately.....they will be okay....they are okay. Perhaps they never needed to be fixed in the first place.

Here's Hoping Next Week is Better

My final algebra course has begun, and it is definitely my Achilles heel. I was upbeat going into the semester because I had the same professor the from previous semester. I even had a gaggling group of girlfriends that I enjoyed sitting with.....but things did not start off in the best way.....The first night, I came in, plopped my textbook down on the desk and a student said, "Hey...what's that?" "Umm, our textbook??" I weakly replied....Well it wasn't the textbook and after a few good natured ribbings from the instructor, I exchanged it for the correct one.....no problem. Next week would be better.

The next week was not better.....I sat down on the front row with my classmates, this time proudly displaying my correct textbook. But, an hour into the class, it was time for a quiz. Not a big deal....only worth twenty points and we could even use our notes. For whatever reason....(that had nothing to do with math)....two questions into the quiz, I started crying...and crying.......uh, and crying. I tried to pull myself together but it just wasn't going to happen. I was in the front row of the class, seated directly in front of the instuctor who was trying to move forward by explaing graphing of Parabolas. I thought about leaving....but I was blocked into my row by an audio visual cart, so I just cried. And, bless his heart, he kept on teaching. He had moved onto Pythagorean Theorems before I finally got my emotions in check.

I could imagine the conversation he had with his wife when he returned home....."Honey, the crazy old woman was back tonight. She did have the right book, but she cried through class...ON THE FRONT ROW.."

So, today, I am over my embarassment and have decided my only option is to study my Algebra for this next class in every available minute I have. Next week I am going to rock my instructor's elliptical world. I will know everything for the test. He won't even believe it is me.......really. I purchased some new eyeglasses along with a hair color and trim.......so I'm thinking maybe with those changes, he won't recognize me...Perhaps he will think that Ramona gave up and is replaced by this new more impressive student .....Yes, creating a dual personality is definitely the next step in convincing him I am a perfectly capable and normal student :))

The Swan's Song
by Alfred Lord Tennyson

I.
The plain was grassy, wild and bare,
Wide, wild, and open to the air,
Which had built up everywhere
An under-roof of doleful gray.
With an inner voice the river ran,
Adown it floated a dying swan,
And loudly did lament.
It was the middle of the day.
Ever the weary wind went on,
And took the reed-tops as it went.

II.
Some blue peaks in the distance rose,
And white against the cold-white sky,
Shone out their crowning snows.
One willow over the river wept,
And shook the wave as the wind did sigh;
Above in the wind was the swallow,
Chasing itself at its own wild will,
And far thro' the marish green and still
The tangled water-courses slept,
Shot over with purple, and green, and yellow.

III.
The wild swan's death-hymn took the soul
Of that waste place with joy
Hidden in sorrow: at first to the ear
The warble was low, and full and clear;
And floating about the under-sky,
Prevailing in weakness, the coronach stole
Sometimes afar, and sometimes anear;
But anon her awful jubilant voice,
With a music strange and manifold,
Flow'd forth on a carol free and bold;
As when a mighty people rejoice
With shawms, and with cymbals, and harps of gold,
And the tumult of their acclaim is roll'd
Thro' the open gates of the city afar,
To the shepherd who watcheth the evening star.
And the creeping mosses and clambering weeds,
And the willow-branches hoar and dank,
And the wavy swell of the soughing reeds,
And the wave-worn horns of the echoing bank,
And the silvery marish-flowers that throng
The desolate creeks and pools among,
Were flooded over with eddying song.

"Be as a bird perched on a frail branch that she feels bending beneath her, still she sings away all the same, knowing she has wings." -Victor Hugo

Politics

Spring Semester is finally here. And, although I only wish to take Art History and French courses, I must get through the necessary courses such as College Algebra and American Government in order to actually receive my degree. I have taken most all of these core requirements years ago. However, due to the fact that it was three decades ago, and the college I attended is “questionable” in their academic standards, I’m forced to take them again.

So, today was the first day of my Political Science class. As usual, I am the token “old lady” or as I refer to myself “Shirley” from the show Community. I read the syllabus and am excited that a big part of our grade is an essay on a political policy of our choosing. I think of the possibilities..all of my bleeding-heart liberal ideals that I cling to. Then, as the professor introduces himself to the class, there is a big hitch in my “giddy-up.” He is very upfront about how conservative his political views are. That’s okay….everyone is entitled to their own views. The thing that bothers me is – I know he is not going to like me. I have no real basis for this statement other than a very strong intuition based on a lifetime of experience of not being liked by this demographic. So, I decide a very low profile is a good idea if I want to get an “A”.

Later, a staff member stops in the class to ask if anyone would be interested in being a “note taker” for a disabled student for the semester. Having decided on my new low profile, I resisted and waited for someone else to volunteer. No one did, and so I raised my hand. I met the young man that I am to scribe for, and it gives me great satisfaction to be able to help……and, I need to be needed.

So, I’m thinking the whole low profile idea was just silliness on my part. We are who we are. If people don’t like us just because of our views, then they are missing out. And, perhaps I should give this professor a chance. Perhaps it is me that is the closed minded one.